Sacrifice Goes Both Ways
by CHAILYN
Summary: starts off as a wee!chester they're in high school fic and will span to current time. Dean's sacrifices for Sam.
1. guidance counselors and bullies

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Dean's Choice 

**_Guidance Counselors and Bullies_**

_**-1-****

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Summary: starts off wee!chester but will span into present time. Dean's sacrifices for his brother. 

Authors Note: pre-series, no spoilers, just a fun and mildly angsty and humorous fic.**

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"Dean, you're letting your family ruin your life." Gracie told him, searching for some kind of indication in his eyes as to why he was throwing his life away like this.

Dean realized he had been mistaken when he'd thought that Gracie would understand it all, he really liked her but she'd never understand, she was just like the rest of them.

"They need me." Dean said, his voice firm, and feeling guilty for even considering the option that he'd been handed. "Sam and my dad, they need me Gracie. I thought you'd at least understand that, even if _they_ don't.

_It all began to unravel for him a week ago, when he was called down to the guidance office—technically, not that abnormal but under the pretenses as it were, it was slightly out of the norm, because this time he wasn't in trouble._

_He walked into Mrs. Creedy's office and was confronted by her and Miss. Madison, his English teacher, who up until this point he'd really liked. She was young, attractive, and didn't treat him like a bad kid based on the assumptions of a few teachers, like many of them did. He couldn't believe she'd done this to him._

"_Sit down, Dean." Mrs. Creedy said. "Don't worry, you're not in trouble."_

"_Fantastic." Dean muttered, "Can I go then? I have stuff to do." _

"_Please sit down, Dean." Miss. Madison said, "I promise this won't take a long time. We just want to talk." _

"_Yes, Dean, we really would love to talk to you."_

_Mrs. Creedy had that counselor voice and that worried Dean, he knew the tone well. It reminded him of the many times that they'd shoved him into the counselor's office at school after school for being 'anti-social'. Well damn them, it was his choice who he wanted to be friends with and they were out of their minds if they thought he'd start acting buddy-buddy with a bunch of jerks and losers to placate them. Instead, he started to date the counselor's daughter and that put an end to the pressure from them._

"_So...what?" Dean asked uncomfortably knowing full well what this was about and having no desire to hash it over with them. He was sure that they all thought he was an idiot but they'd never understand and he could never make them understand what a complicated decision this was...its didn't just involve him._

"_We were just a little concerned when we heard that you rejected the scholarship that USC had offered you." Miss. Madison said._

"_Did you decide on another school?" Mrs. Creedy questioned._

"_I never applied for that scholarship." Dean said._

"_I know." Miss. Madison said, "But your paper was just so beautiful that I entered it for you since you didn't seem to want to—you won, Dean. Its a full scholarship."_

"_I know." Dean said. _

_He wasn't stupid he knew how big that was but...he couldn't leave Sammy, Sam needed him, and so did their dad._

"_I don't want it." Dean said. "I'm not going to college."_

_The looks they gave him made him glad that it would be only a few more weeks before he was done, because they'd never understand it._

"You're being ridiculous." Gracie said. Clearly they'd returned to the topic of the scholarship he was giving up. "Your dad is the dad, not you. You can't let him be your excuse for giving up a great future."

"It's not just him, Sam's just a kid, he needs me."

"He's not a kid, Dean, and he doesn't need you to babysit or to be his father. It's not your job—he already has one."

"He's twelve!" Dean objected. His brother needed him, and he couldn't care less what she had to say, Sam was no more closer to being an adult than he was ten years ago, no matter how mature he was.

"Exactly." Gracie said, starting to get up. "And he's going to make his own decisions...the same thing that you need to do. Don't let them decide your future for you Dean, it isn't fair."

"What do you know about fair? You have the perfect life and the perfect family, I guess its easy just to think about yourself! You have no idea what its like..." Dean stopped there, he had gone too far.

"Only think of myself..." Gracie tried out the words, fighting the tears. She thought Dean had known her better than that, to think of her like that...she thought he saw her differently than everyone else at this school did...clearly not. "It must be such a struggle just to be in the same room as me." Gracie turned away as the tears started to fall and grabbed her purse off of the table. Gracie walked away not looking back.

"Gracie!" Dean ran after her, the guilt eating him up. It wasn't her fault and now he was taking his frustrations out on the only person he could talk to-aside from Sammy—and their were some things he couldn't talk to Sam about that he could always tell Gracie about.

She was the only girl he'd ever trusted their secret with, and she didn't run away when he did. Gracie didn't deserve the way he was treating her.

"Gracie, stop." Dean grabbed her shoulder and pulled her around. "I'm sorry, I—I didn't mean that, it-it's not true...please, forgive me?"

Dean looked up at her his big brown eyes shining with guilt an she couldn't help but to forgive him. She wasn't trying to be difficult, it was just that she loved him and wanted the best for him. She wanted him to escape this life that he clearly hated, but would never admit to hating.

"You're perfect." Dean said, "There isn't a mean or selfish bone in your body..." Dean grinned seeing that she was starting to budge, "If there were, how would you be able to put up with a horrible jerk like me?"

"I guess I just have really low standards."

Dean wiped away a stray tear, kissed her tenderly, and led her back into the house.

"Dean, I know you have your reasons but...why? Why are you so willing to throw this away? It's a chance that people would die for." Gracie wished he'd help her to understand, even after he'd told her about their life, he still felt like their was this secret hidden part of Dean's life that she knew nothing about.

"I..." Dean's voice trailed off as he heard the door slam shut. "Sammy's home."

"Dean?" Sam called out.

"Bedroom!" Dean hollered back. "Gracie," He whispered, "Promise me, not a word to Sam about the school thing, okay?"

"I..."

"Promise." Dean demanded.

"Not a word." Gracie said quietly.

"Hi Sam." Gracie said, as he walked into Dean's room.

"Oh, hi Gracie." Sam said.

"Hey Sammy, how was school?" Dean asked.

""It's Sam." He said, the correction was second nature by now, he said it nearly automatically. "Fine. Where's dad?"

"He had to go before I got home, he's on a job in Washington...with Caleb."

"Oh." Sam's voice dropped and octave and Dean was reminded of a kicked puppy. Couldn't she see, this was why he couldn't leave. "When's he coming back?"

"Not sure, he said he'd call. Probably not for a while."

"Okay," Sam replied. "I'm going to go do my homework..." Sam walked off and Dean remembered something.

"I'll be right back." He told Gracie, jogging out to the hallway to catch up with Sam.

"Sam, did you change that dressing on your leg? Remember,..."

"Twice a day." Sam finished, "Yeah, I'll go do it now."

"You want some help?"

"I'm not a baby, Dean." Sam objected uncomfortably, still embarrassed by his screw up. "I can do it myself."

A month ago on a hunt, Sam had messed up and got in the way of a hell hound who had tried to chow down on his leg. His dad would have still been yelling at him if Dean hadn't defended him and told their dad to back down. It took what seemed like a million stitches but at least he could walk. Dean had babied him for weeks after the incident...he wished his brother would see that he wasn't a stupid kid.

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"Sam, why don't you tell your brother?" Taylor asked, helping him up off of the ground as Colton walked away laughing with his friends. 

"No. no way Taylor, and you can't tell him either." Sam said. "Dean already thinks I'm still a baby and can't take care of myself."

"You'd rather be Colton's punching bag?" Taylor asked with a raised eyebrow.

"I can take care of him." Sam said.

"Oh, right, because you've done such a bang up job of that thus far."

Sam frowned, "You sound like my brother."

"Well, then, she must be right." Dean said sneaking up behind them. "Sammy, Taylor, what's going on guys?"

"Just class." Sam said not wanting to give Taylor an opportunity to spill the whole Colton thing to his brother. "Same place you should be actually."

"Class is over-rated, I have better things to do." Like avoid English, Dean thought.

"Oh really," Taylor drawled, her heavy Kentucky accent even heavier as she lowered the tone of her voice. "What's her name?"

Sam snorted, if his brother wasn't currently having this thing with Gracie--something that shocked him as Dean didn't do long term, especially with rich girls--he was sure that Taylor would be right.

"Dad's going to kill you if he find's out you skipped class."

"Dad's not going to find out." Dean said. "I just got a message from him in my voicemail. He left early to meet up with Caleb for _work." _

"He'll still find out." Sam said.

"Whatever. I just wanted to see if you wanted a ride before I left."

"No." Sam said, "I am going to class, so I can you know, pass."

"Okay…goody two shoes." Dean smirked.

"Really, Sam, because I think it would be better if you took your brother up on that, we could go and take in a movie or something."

"Uh, Taylor, isn't your mom home?" Sam asked.

"Oh, she doesn't care." Taylor waved it off. "Really. Take up your brother's offer _Sam_."

"No." Sam said, knowing exactly what she was trying to do. He wasn't going to run away from a fight either. "I'm going to class."

Dean sighed, "I've tried so hard, but Sammy, you are clearly a lost case. Taylor, you want a ride?"

"No, Dean." Sam said, "_Taylor _and _I _have _class_."

"He's right." Taylor sighed.

"Well, okay. I'll be back at three to pick you up Sammy."

"I hope you're ready to add dead to your list of injuries." Taylor said once Dean was out of earshot.

"I'll be fine." Sam said, currently not so sure of it.

"Did I mention that you've added mindless idiot to that list?" Taylor asked.

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"Let's go down to the quad for lunch." Gracie suggested. 

Dean readily agreed, even though he had planned on them leaving campus..easier to avoid nosy teachers that way; the quad connected the middle and high schools and it would give him a chance to check on Sam, as they had lunch at the same time. Sam hated when he did it, but he had no intentions of letting Sam know he was checking up on him. Or so that had been his plan before they got to the quad, and Dean saw Sam getting knocked to the floor by a guy twice his size.

Dean automatically switched into big brother mode as he saw this. He ran over, pulled the guy off of Sam and knocked him down with one swift punch that probably could have taken down a windego. After that he went to go and check on Sam.

Dean helped his brother up off of the ground who looked like he'd gone a few rounds with a hell hound—which he did last week, and Dean was praying that Sammy wasn't in too bad shape because another trip to the ER wouldn't exactly go unnoticed.

"Hey..Hey, are you okay?" Dean asked his brother, checking him over as thoroughly as he could.

"Fine." Sam mumbled, embarrassed that his big brother was fighting his battles for him.

"Are you sure?" Dean was worried, Sam's eye looked like it was swelling up pretty bad and the trickle of blood coming from his nose wasn't at all reassuring.

Dean's glance tuned to the left just in time to see the jerk that was picking on his brother try to blindside him. Dean hit him, and gave him a kick in the side.

"You come near my brother again and I'll kill you." Dean whispered in his ear. "Got it?"

Dean helped his brother up. "C'mon I'll take you home and we'll get you patched up."

Sam stood up, suddenly feeling a pain in his arm, and grabbed it trying to keep it stable in the hopes that would make it stop.

It didn't go unnoticed by Dean and he hoped to god it wasn't broken.

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_so..chapter one, it got a bit longer than i intended but there was a lot of ground that I wanted to cover. hope you liked it, more to come soon._


	2. Telling The Truth Is Easy

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Sacrifice Goes Both Ways

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"Dad's going to kill me." Sam mumbled still pretty drugged up from their visit to the emergency room.

"Don't worry Sammy." Dean told him, feeling bad he hadn't broken up the fight before that massive idiot broke his brother's arm. "I'll explain to dad, just try and relax."

Gracie had totally saved their lives, turned out her aunt was a doctor at the local emergency room.

Her aunt had patched him up quite well and Dean was surprised by how easily and believably Gracie had lied to her aunt. For being a doctor, she bought the excuse that they didn't have any insurance yet because their dad was in-between jobs and wrapped him up no questions asked pretty well. It was actually a little scary how good of a liar she was, Dean didn't think she'd be out of place in the Winchester family with how easily lying came to her.

"Thanks a lot." Dean told her once Sam was fairly unconscious once again, and he'd pulled up to her house.

"No problem." She said grabbing her bag and getting out of the impala. "Just...Dean think about what I said, please...don't let it be your family okay?"

Dean's hands tightened around the steering wheel, his knuckles turning white. He glanced down at Sam, slumped in the passenger's seat still asleep thankfully. The last thing he wanted was for his brother to know about this. He knew what Sam would tell him, but what Sam didn't know was that he'd be wrong. Dean wasn't going to run away and have his family fall apart.

"I should get Sam home." He said his voice tight.

Gracie sighed, "Fine. I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Sam and I won't be in school. He's going to need a couple days off..."

"Fine." She said, wondering why he had to make it so difficult. She really liked Dean but being with him...she had no idea what was going on in his head sometimes. "Call me if you're not too busy."

She was annoyed with him, Dean could tell that much but he just couldn't deal with it right now. He'd make it up to her later, he always did. Right now he had his family to deal with, and that was his priority.

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When Dean heard the doorbell he rushed to answer the door figuring it was Gracie. A couple of days had passed and she had cooled off enough to agree to come over and so he was surprised when he opened the door and saw Taylor.

"Oh. It's you."

"Yeah. Hi to you too." Taylor said.

Dean grinned, "Sorry. Come on in."

"So, whats got you acting all charming?"

"Oh, but I'm always charming." Dean replied. "But why are you gracing us with your presence?"

"Sam asked me to pick up some school work since you're still detaining him here-his words, not mine." Taylor gestured to the bag of books.

"Wow, no breaks for honor students, huh?"

"What? No, that's all your work. Except for the calculus. Everyone except Thoms told him not to worry about it."

"My work?" Dean was stunned. "Why my work?"

"Sam told me to get your work too. By the way, its all due as soon as you come back."

"Sam!" Dean hollered. He was going to kill his brother.

Sam walked in stifling a laugh. He had a feeling that Taylor was here.

"Hey Dean, Taylor." He said innocently. "What's going on? Is that my work?"

"Just this." Taylor said handing him his calculus book.

"Sam, I'm going to kill you." Dean narrowed his eyes at his brother. "How am I supposed to have fun with all this work?"

"I don't know. But maybe now you wont be so bored that you won't have to put itching powder in my _clothes_."

"Like my underwear turned pink on their own." Dean shot back.

Taylor struggled not to laugh. She'd known something was up when Sam called and asked her to pick up both his and Deans homework.

"I didn't touch your underwear!" Sam replied, "Do you really think I'd want to endanger my health like that?"

Dean glared at his younger brother, and Sam returned the look. It was getting to be too much, and way too hilarious, for Taylor, and so she broke the silence. It was the perfect opportunity too as Gracie pulled her car into the driveway.

"By the way," Taylor said as she saw Gracie's car pull up through the front window. "Whatever you did, just apologize."

"Huh?" Dean looked at her in confusion. He thought she was talking to him...he was pretty sure she was talking to him...but what the hell could she be talking about?

Before Taylor could help him out the doorbell rang.

"Dean, really, whatever you did, suck up the pride and apologize, k-ay? It's for your own well being."

Sam looked like he was going to burst out in laughter. Taylor was scary good...if he didn't know better he'd think she was psychic or something. Somehow, the girl always seemed to know what was going on.

As Dean moved to open the door, the phone rang. Both brothers froze. A grand total of three people had the number to that phone—their dad, Caleb, and Pastor Jim.

"Sam, get the door." Dean ordered, their dad hadn't called in a couple of days but he didn't exactly call regularly, Dean figured he must be calling to check up on them.

Sam answered the door, flinching inwardly as he thought to what his dad's reaction was going to be when he found out about his arm...he was going to be grounded until, oh, the end of forever.

Dean picked up the phone on the second ring.

"Hello?"

"Dean." John's voice come in clear over the line, Dean guessed he wasn't out in the forests any longer.

"Dad, hey, how's the hunt?"

"Good. Good, are you and your brother doing well?"

"Yeah, but dad..." Dean's voice trailed off as he heard some noise in the background on his dad's side.

John swore quietly, but Dean didn't miss it.

"Listen Dean, this hunt's taking a bit longer than expected. I'm not gonna be home for another week at least."

"Okay." Dean said quickly, "But dad—"

Dean was cut off once more.

"Dean, I'll call you back as soon as possible. Caleb and I have to get going though, the police are sticking their noses in this one...I'll call soon, look out for your brother, okay?"

"Yeah but..." Dean groaned as his dad hung up the phone. Something was definitely going on with him. He just wished that his dad would have stayed on long enough for him to explain what had happened to Sam.

"Was that dad?" Sam asked, alternating between concern for the trouble he was going to be in and eagerness for his dad to return. He and Dean understood full well how dangerous hunting was, and they worried about him when he was gone.

"Yeah," Dean replied looking from Sam to Gracie. "Looks like he's not going to be home for a while longer."

"Oh." Sam said trying to mask his disappointment. "Right." He turned to Taylor, "C'mon we have studying to do."

Taylor followed and Dean was left alone with Gracie.

"So..." He said

"Yeah." She replied, "Dean..."

"I'm sorry, okay?" He said, "Gracie, I know you put up with a lot from me, its just...I thought you understood. Sam has to come first."

"Fine." Gracie said, "But you can't keep putting him before yourself. You keep doing that, and I can promise you Dean, whether you want to or not, you're going to start to resent him. Maybe even hate him."

"No." Dean said, "It not like that with us, and I know you take this as an insult but Sam and I, and our dad, we're all the family we've got left. We have to stick together."

"Maybe." She said, "But do you really want hunting to be for forever? To be your father?" Gracie could see his features tightening over his attractive face but, if she had to make him angry to see the truth, so be it. She loved him, and she was going to help him to see what was best for him even if he had to hate her for it. "Do you think this is what your mom wanted for you? Because from what you've told me...I don't think so."

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"What are they talking about?" Sam asked, backtracking to get Taylor when he reached his room and realized she was still listening in on Dean and Gracie's—from what he gathered by the look on Gracie's face, Dean's back was to him—angry conversation.

"Dean's commitment issues." Taylor lied easily, lying was important sometimes. It was one of the biggest things she'd learned in her life. No one always wanted the truth, it was a funny thing but sometimes telling the truth was the easy part, the big sacrifice was, do you love someone enough to lie to them?

"Oh," Sam half-shrugged, the cast making it a bit difficult. "They'll get over it, it happens about once a week."

"Yeah," Taylor's voice was low, "I don't think this time is going to be like the other times."

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End file.
